It’s weird to think of James Cameron as an auteur since he makes the biggest movies ever, but Avatar: The Way of Water does feel like a combination of all the things he loves to put in his movies and it bears his distinct fingerprint.

I wish more filmmakers had the juice to execute their vision with a $250 million budget instead of being forced to crank out generic, studio-mandated, CGI-filled products. Avatar 2 might not be a narrative masterpiece, but it’s so much nicer when movies feel like they were made by a person instead of an algorithm.

Here’s my Avatar: The Way of Water review on Letterboxd. More reviews on Trashwire.